I am trying to create a closed caption in premiere pro cc (trial version) but when I am in the captions tab, am unable to select the 'add' caption button. I have enabled the captions and have watched many video tutorials and searched the web for answers but there is nothing about why the 'add' caption option might not be available?

Thanks for this, I have tried that option and seen that adobe help page. The captions still don't show up on my video - I have enabled the closed captions in the top right hand drop down menu, I have selected the correct time that I want the caption to appear and it just doesn't appear.

If anyone could help me that would be great, the following is what I have done:

I am having this same problem. I partially moved to Premiere CC for the closed captioning feature and it is not working. As you have done, I have read the help files and watched many videos on how to do it. I'm doing it exactly the way the describe and show, but the text is simply not appearing on the footage. It is enabled, everything is in place. but no text. Need a solution to this.

make sure your sequence is 720x486 not 720x480 which clips out the line 21 area needed for the captioning to go.

to see the captions in the program monitor you have to turn on the captioning view button in the program monitor (right monitor) if you don't see it, you need to add the button in the customization settings for the program monitor.

turn on your overscan on your external monitor and you will see the little captioning line blips at the very top.

I did an edit to tape to make a digibeta and it worked perfectly.

what did not seem to work was exporting a prores quicktime file with the captioning embeded, the line blips were not

present, but editing laying back to tape it did work so I just recaptured from the tape.

I don't think this is my issue at all. In fact, I have been working with it more and found even more issues. The reason it is not appearing where it should is because it is now appearing where it should not.

Also, I tried to start from scratch with it. deleted the Closed Caption layer and made a brand new one. Entered each segment in, aligned the text correctly, kept it all white, re-rendered. Same deal. Three segments into it, it starts overlapping and getting completely messed up.

Please be more specific about what you mean by "it doesn't show up on my video." Do you mean that you can't see the captions displayed in the Source Monitor? In the Timeline? In the Program Monitor? In encoded outputs with captions set to be embedded?

If you're referring to either or both of the monitors in PPRO, have you enabled caption display and made sure in each monitor's Closed Captions Display Settings dialog that the Standard and Stream match your source captions?

I am having the same issue in PProCC. The captions are showing in the captions tab & in my timeline. But they are not showing in the Program Monitor and I have enabled them. I have also done what you suggested here ensuring that the Settings match. In the Source monitor the option to enable is not available (greyed out).

I am having the same issue, but my video track is not disabled. Everything should be working fine. But no subtitles show up at all.

I alerted Adobe to this problem over two months ago and they did a screen share to see it. They said they would get back to me and never did. I need to get ahold of them again as I have two projects for paying clients that have been delayed because the CC simply does not work. I had hoped the latest updates woudl fix this, but no dice.

When we create a new closed caption the default settings (at least for my footage) are CEA-608 but the source monitor's closed caption's settings are by default CEA-708.So change that to CEA-608 and enable to view them.

I'm not too sure but I believe the "CEA-608" displays SD captions while "CEA-708" displays HD captions.Hope that helps.

Hi I got a problem with closed captions when I enabled them on the top right corner and put the setting to "708", then I go to File - New - Closed Caption and create a new one with the setting "708" to match it, I type my text, then I just Click on the time lime and the Closed Caption dissapears instantly no matter wha value (608) I put on the settings on either panel. Am I missing something?

Here is what is happening and here is how I work around it. And it is not a happy work around.

I create the closed captioning file, enable the closed captioning window and enable the program closed caption window making sure it is the same cea-708 format. Then when creating captions it is hit or miss, some of them show up some of them do not, there is a sure fire way to tell if it is going to show or not. The black boxes on the left (although very tiny and unreadable) will show the white text. If there is no white text showing there then the caption is not going to show in the program window. It will still show in the timeline, however it will not display on the program window and it will not export.

So some of the captions worked just fine and display properly with no issues, I was able to get about 20 or so captions in a row working properly then I got another blank one. I have tried deleting the caption and creating a new one, I have tried closing premiere and re-opening and still same thing, the next caption will be blank.

My horrible work around: if I leave the blank caption and then create a new one right after it, the new caption works. so for every blank caption I have to create a second one. Pain in the butt! specially considering I am captioning a feature film.

I am supposed to deliver my film to the distributor next week, which is my problem but I could have had a caption service do it for me for about $150 no head aches, instead I went with the CC cloud thing and just like I thought...issues.

First image is the broken caption:

Second image is working caption (BUT ONLY WORKS AFTER KEEPING THE BROKEN ONE IN, if the broken one is deleted the new one also will be broken.)

I have been in contact with Adobe engineers about the multitude of problems with closed captioning. I have had this same issue and others. Adobe has even done screen shares to try and see the problem. Every time, they tell me that they concluded this is the way closed captioning standards work and the overlapping/erroneous timings/just plain buggy performance is not a bug. They say they do not consider it a bug at this time. Even though they see it mess up and have no idea how to fix it.

The closed captioning system is completely unusable. I do understand how it works, how it should work and the cc system with premiere is an epic fail. I have completely given up using it and have had to drop it from my services offered to clients. I have told adobe there problems and shown them how unusable it is with no Updates to fix these problems. So I'm just dismissing it as a viable feature until Adobe figures out they are wrong and this needs to be fixed.

Sorry to hear that. Very disappointed but this has been the issue with Adobe for YEARS! This is what keeps people away, I know this is why I stayed away for so long and kept using Avid. Although Premiere is feature rich, it makes no difference if those features do not work as intended.

I just proved that the BUG is in fact a BUG above. This is not how any other caption program reacts, this is not because of over lapping captions, it just decides intermittently when it doesn't want to display a caption.

There is a BUGGY work around just leave the dead caption there and add another caption right after it and the text will show. It is a pain but it works. This is most certainly something Adobe can and will eventually fix. They just tend to play a certain card until they figure it out.

I am sure they have their work cut out for them this is complicated stuff but to pretend that the issue doesn't exsist is crazy, which is the bugger issue, a disservice to their customers. We are just looking for some transparency and honesty Adobe, admit there is an issue and let us know if it is being worked on and a reasonable time frame so we can seek other options in the mean time.

A few other bugs I have noticed when attempting to use the closed caption function.

1. Intermittently when you click the timecode of a caption and slide left or right to adjust the code the mouse cursor disappears, only inside premiere move your mouse around outside the premiere window and mouse is back, items will still high light inside premiere but the cursor is gone, the only way to get it back is to close premiere and re-open.

2. In the timeline window you cannot adjust the or manipulate the caption handle bars to adjust the timecode start and end times.

I'm sorry closed captioning is not working for you. I know if the caption file framerate does not match the frame rate of the Sequence and the Source clip, we can get into problems with displaying captions, or some captions will not display due to framerate mismatch. This is one thing you can check for. Making sure the frame rates of the closed captioning file matching the Source and Sequence framerate.

My closed captions are just not showing in the exported movie. I can see them in Premiere CC. But nothing in the exported media file. EVEN if I embed them in a .mov, the captions are not showing (and yes, I did click on the View -> Show Closed Captioning. Nothing works.No matter what format of movie I choose and settings for closed captioning in all these formats.

I will admit I find that the CC in Premiere Pro are far from perfect, but if you observe the rules they do work correctly. Now I have a few years of experience handling closed captions for DVD, and creating test QC streams for closed caption decoders. First you can not have a caption start and end on the same frame. It is always good to have at least 1 frame of space between them. Second QT only decodes 608 captions so you can not see the 708 captions decoded caption in QT. In HD Programing both 608 and 708 captions must be present.

Now I have successfully created file that pass QC for major broadcasters out of Premiere CC, but there was a work around. I will not detail everything, but it went like this.

Create 608 captions respecting all of the rules needed for closed captions.

Export an xml sidecar file of these captions

edit the header of the xml file telling it it is a 708 file (Not as simple as the explanation)

import the new 708 xml file.

Put the file on the timeline with the 608 file

Readjust the position of the text. 708 has a different number of characters that it bases it's position on.

Export an mxf file.

To test I simply reimport the mxf file and check that the captions come in correctly.

Send it off for broadcast.

Remember 608 captions were created to run at 29.97fps, and they were represented by little dots at the top of the screen you could not see on the TV. They can only stream so many dots per second so there are rules for how you do captions based on this limitation. That why captioning software is so specific for something that seems so easy. Some standards testing routine should be added to assure compliance, like the caption editor having a red line around it to say "Hey you cant do that"

CC won't ever show up embedded in a file. That was a disappointing thing to find out for me. I was hoping to use it to subtitle a foreign film I am working on. True CC'ing isn't meant to be subtitles. It has industry/broadcast standards that allow you to export what is called a "side car" file with the CC info (text and time markers) or a file where the CC is embedded in the video as data, but it does not show up unless you have a capable of turning the CC on. It won't show up by default in a video.

I can only say I have found several bugs. There have been times when I have a CC overlay on a video and it will show partial text, start backtracking over it before it runs out, way before any other element should be shown. Then when I delete the entire CC overlay, sometimes a few letters of the text show up in video window still, even though its completely removed from the timeline. Other bugs persist as well. It's definitely a Premiere issue and now the way CC is supposed to work.

If this is the way CC works with all these eccentricities, no one would ever be able to viably use it.

Hello Kevin. Thank you for your reply, but I am not understanding much of it.

I exported the movie as Quicktime, captions separate and as xml.

I open the xml in a text editor. I am not sure what part is the header. But I see 608 several times in the content. So I change all to 708 and resave.

Importing the new xml file back into premiere does not put the xml anywhere on the time line. A little box pops up saying it is importing and then disappears. I don't see anything happen.

So I go to media browser and try to drag and drop the xml file to timeline while wondering what you mean by "Put the file on the timeline with the 608 file". Do you mean on top of it on the same line/channel? As in overlapping it? Next to it? In the channel above it? What do you mean?

But I see that no channels/lines are letting me drop an xml file onto them

Stumped.

By thew way, I can import the .scc file into Youtube and it works just fine.

But I need these close captiones to appear in a movie that I load to my own website.

That is why I thought embedded closed captioning in a .mov would be good. I was surprised when they did not show up. I look into it and see I must switch on View Closed Captioning in the .mov movie player. But STILL no captioning shows up.

How the heck does one have a video, with closed captioning, on your own website?

But I need these close captiones to appear in a movie that I load to my own website.

That statement says it all. You are trying to provide subtitles for web video. Each player has a different method for playing subtitles or captions on the web.

As you said when you load the scc file into youtube it works fine, just not on your website. What palyer are you using on your website? Why not take the easy route and embed the video from youtube, or vimeo on your website. This is what I do and it works like a charm.

Now as to the whole 708 vs 608 thing you only need both when you broadcast HD for Cable or TV. This is what closed captions are intended for. to create a scc file you only need 608 captions.